Japan has achieved the world's highest life-expectancy under a universal health coverage system. The purpose of this book is to discuss effective management accounting methods for solving various issues now faced by the healthcare system in Japan (low birth-rate and aging society, issues in medical public finance, issues attendant to advancements of healthcare services, etc.). This book is written by Japanese researchers who are active and at the forefront of management accounting research for healthcare, such as Takami Matsuo, Kazunori Ito, Yutaka Kato, and so on. This book shows the actual use of cost information, cost-management, and management-control methods for healthcare organizations in Japan, and examines how to adopt management accounting methods used by companies in healthcare management, which would be a useful reference for future healthcare management in countries that might face similar issues as Japan in the future.

With the service industry taking up the largest portion of its GDP, Japan has much to share in the area of managing service industry. This book explores and elucidates the unique management styles in non-manufacturing industries or service industries in contemporary Japan, both practically and theoretically through case studies. These specially selected cases are the management of the world No.1 convenience store chain of Seven-Eleven, the sales finance business and auto sales business of Toyota, application of TPS (Toyota Production System) to life insurance company, performance evaluation of local government, BSC (balance scorecard) in local government hospitals, cost and pricing policy of telecommunication company, Japanese-style "hospitality" in the retail industry, service level agreement (SLA) in IT and shared service companies, and ICT (Information & Communication Technology) applied to BPN (Business Process Network) of service industry.The analyses presented in this book were carefully laid out in regard to the business in general. It will be useful for business practitioners in service industry and beneficial to the scholars, students or general readers interested in this area.